The Script We Follow
by HecateA
Summary: Both of them are spies—good spies, actually, which is why they find each other. But Dumbledore's finest and the Dark Lord's supposedly most loyal servant had no idea how complicated that discovery would be.Written for Romance Awareness Day 22: One sentence a day that you say/write appears on your soulmate's skin. Oneshot.


**Author's Note:** Written for the 31 Days of Soulmate!AU Day 22: One sentence a day that you say/write appears on your soulmate's skin.

**Dedication: **To who delivered some prompts in Super Drabble Tag that led to me writing these two as spies.

**Disclaimer: **The following characters belong to J.K. Rowling, and this story derives from her original works, storylines, and world. Please do not sue me, I can barely pay tuition.

**Warnings: **Spy behaviour; lying, manipulation, physical altercations

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**Stacked with: **MC4A; Hogwarts; Ray of Blades; Not Commonwealth; Harmony of Souls Eternal

**Bonus challenge(s): **Gryffindor MC; Slytherin MC; Bow Before the Blacks; Seeds; Ways to the Heart; Minerva's Migraine; Old Shoes; Trope it Up A (Enemies to Lovers); Trope it Up C (Accidental Confession); Themes & Things A (Secrets); Themes & Things B (Deception); Not Just Straightening and Handwashing; True Colours; Rian-Russo Inversion; Short Jog; Yellow Ribbon; Yellow Ribbon Redux

**Representation(s): **Soulmate!AU; Wizarding War spies

**Bonus challenge(s): **Lyre Liar; Muck & Slime; Abandoned Ship; Head of Perseus; In the Trench; Surprise!; Second Verse (Pear-Shaped); Chorus (Middle Name)

**Tertiary bonus challenge: **Schooner; Sanctuary

**Word count: **2602

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_**Hogwarts Submitting Info**_

**House: **Ravenclaw

**Assignment: **Assignment #2, Astronomy Task 3 - Use the theme of Achilles Heel (a small problem or weakness in a person or system that can result in failure) in your fic.

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**The Script We Follow **

Regulus Black was nothing if not methodical. This was one of the reasons why the words appearing on his arms and legs and across his chest—randomly, unannounced, upside-down, and with no rhyme or rhyme or reason—drove him mad. Sirius had told him that there'd come a day where he wouldn't mind it because he'd be in love with the soulmate whose words they were. One day, they might even help him find his way back to the man, woman, or otherwise identifiable person of his dreams. Regulus hadn't liked that answer either.

"Turn it into something you like, then," Sirius had then said with a shrug.

And so Regulus had, by turning the script on his body into a neatly organized list. At first it was on spare bits of paper and parchment that he found around the house. On brave days, he'd even knock on his father's office door and ask for it. Eventually, he received leatherbound notebooks for his birthday and began keeping track in more centralized, organized ways. He became methodical and organized in his cataloguing. It became as much a part of his day as his three cups of Earl Grey or the way he had to tie and untie his shoes twice before leaving the house—and eventually the Slytherin Common Room.

Regulus had no idea who the soulmate speaking these words into existence was. Everything that appeared on his skin was either generic enough or too out-of-context for him to tack it onto someone he knew—not to mention the distinct possibility that he didn't know them at all. Besides: even if the note-taking and indexing was part of his routine and rituals now, he had bigger things to worry about than the possibility of some soulmate adrift in the world.

No, Regulus had more immediate and pressing problems as the war brew, approaching a climax that nobody understood but that they could all feel. Now that Kreacher had filled in significant parts of the puzzle, Regulus was particularly alarmed—while doing everything in his power to make sure that his anxiety and his growing certitude that he could no longer stand by this didn't translate into panic. When people panicked, they made mistakes. When people made mistakes this close to the Dark Lord, they died. It was quite simple. Regulus had seen and catalogued this away, too.

And Regulus was—still close to the Dark Lord, that was. The Occlumency he'd picked up during his childhood was serving him well now, apparently, because the Dark Lord's confidence in Regulus hadn't wavered. This explained why he had been sent to infiltrate the ritzy International Confederation of Wizards. His mission was not to kill Albus Dumbledore necessarily; but to observe him in an open setting, to gather intelligence about the man's habits and behaviour outside of Hogwarts. Someone else would do the deed later; the Dark Lord had confided to Regulus that he would send someone much more disposable than his loyal spy.

In the meantime, Regulus highly suspected that the woman who had whisked him away and dragged him to her own dinner table was on a mission too. He honestly wouldn't be able to explain how it had happened; he'd walked into the hotel's ballroom and she'd appeared out of nowhere, latched onto his arm, and redirected him to where she wanted him before Regulus could even say '_Quidditch.' _The speeches and the award ceremony had bled into dinner service so quickly that Regulus was, for all intents and purposes, stuck across the table from her. She'd introduced herself as 'Petunia Dursley,' but Regulus didn't believe it—it had to be a pseudonym. He'd been instructed to dispose of any Order agents in attendance, but something about this one… well, there was a lot to take in. He had a sneaking suspicion of who she was, but Regulus was taking his time with her. She seemed happy, playing with her own food and sending him charming smiles as well.

If nothing else, she looked stunning and elegant enough to fit in with the crowd of international witches and wizards and wix, albeit a little young—much like himself. She wore a long black dress and a golden shawl over her otherwise bare shoulders. She was tall and suave, carrying herself with that strange mixture of put-togetherness and casualness that Regulus envied in others. The bulk of her brown corkscrew curls were swept over one shoulder and her lips were thin and symmetrical—Regulus had never spent so long looking at someone's lips. She wore a ring with a single ruby on it, and her nails were tinged just a tad yellow, as if she smoked.

She swirled her wine in her glass as she talked to him, chatty and casual, bold and pleasant. If Regulus weren't a spy himself, he probably wouldn't have detected the carefulness and deliberacy behind her… well, frankly _flirtatious _behaviour. If he weren't a spy himself, he would absolutely have fallen through to her words. Head over heels, for that matter… He actually had to try quite hard not to enjoy himself.

"You're not taking many photos for an event photographer," she said again before slipping a piece of cake in her mouth. She looked up at him teasingly, as if she was playing around instead of digging for information and trying to poke holes in the cover story he'd fed her. It was like she was spitting it out, but she'd pocketed the spoon. Oh, she was good.

"My contract begins tomorrow," Regulus said. "My colleague is taking care of tonight's events. I was simply offered a chance to spend time in the venue to observe the lighting. Besides, I'm never one to turn down a free meal."

She laughed.

"My mother had a saying about that," the woman said. "She said that food was the only thing worth going anywhere for."

Regulus froze just as he was about to take another bite of his fruit tart when she said that.

He could visualize, in his head, which of his three notebooks of soul script those words, or a variation of them, had been inscribed. He could point out the parts of him that bore her words too; his collarbone, the crook of his left elbow, his outer left thigh.

Oh, no.

Regulus looked this woman from top to bottom again, with this information in mind now. She was outstandingly beautiful—that hadn't changed. As he mulled things over snippets from his notebooks, he suddenly realized which ones of them could very well be slotted into conversations from Hogwarts, Gryffindor Quidditch team banter, and maybe even Order of the Phoenix meetings. He grew even more and more sure that this woman was Marlene McKinnon.

She was only a year older than he was but even if that wasn't true, never in a thousand years would they have run in the same circles, though he supposed that she must know Sirius. Even for those who had been in her year, say people like Severus, McKinnon was hard to trace—so hard that there were whispers that she was a Metamorphmagus status. Truth be told, most Death Eaters were afraid of her.

They suspected McKinnon of more than they could accurately hold her accountable for—strange deaths, bodies in hotel beds, bodies dumped in the woods, poisons drunk by people who should have known better, Death Eaters who just went missing… Even if only half of her kill count was true, she was one of the Order of the Phoenix' most powerful operatives. Regulus wasn't one to flatter himself, but if one member of the Order of the Phoenix was to accompany Albus Dumbledore on an international trip abroad where a capable Death Eater would most likely be in attendance… McKinnon was a logical choice.

Regulus had to think fast.

"You know, they also offered me a room for the duration of the conference," Regulus said.

"Really?" she said, arching an eyebrow. She measured him up for a second before smiling. "I have to share, mine."

"I don't," Regulus said. He picked up the napkin on his lap and laid it on the table. He looked at her for a second before standing.

Marlene quickly downed her last bite of cake before wiping her lips with her napkin and gently putting it down.

"Offer me your arm," she said with a smile. Regulus smiled back and he did.

"You know what you want," he noted.

"You should be flattered."

Regulus broke eye contact for a second and noticed the words etching themselves on the back of his left hand. _You should be flattered. _

Something twisted in Regulus' gut. Merlin, what a mess. What a way for this introduction to take place. What a time, what a place, what a warzone. Sirius had told him that one day, this web of words wandering across his body would help him find his soulmate. And until this very moment, when it had in the worst way… well, Regulus had forgotten about his fate, even as it had unfolded on his skin. That had been a mistake on his end; he saw that now. Fate, whoever she was and however her magic worked, forgot nothing.

And now Regulus was making his way out of the ballroom and into the hotel with Marlene McKinnon on his arm, and… well, nothing left to lose. That was what it came down to, really.

Regulus Black had nothing to lose.

He didn't know much about this woman, this was possibly not even her real face. But he knew that he couldn't let harm come her way.

And so he pulled her into a service hallway, immobilizing both of her arms against the wall before she could reach for her wand.

"Be quiet, I won't hurt you, don't waste your time on me," Regulus said quietly. "I was sent here by Lord Voldemort, but you have my word that I won't hurt anyone."

He couldn't quite blame her when she kneed him in the groin and pushed him away, twisting them so that now he was pinned to the wall. She had her wand against the pulsepoint of his throat too. He wondered where she'd been stashing it, but this was not the point.

"That's very difficult for me to believe," Marlene said sweetly. "You see, Mr Black, I hear things… about you, of course, but many other things too."

"They're probably true," Regulus admitted. "But so is what I'm saying now."

Marlene's perfectly composed face went white when he said it and Regulus gulped.

"You have that written somewhere… don't you?"

Marlene's breath left her in a puff, as if she'd been hit in the stomach, and she dropped the glamour over her. Very little about her appearance changed—her hair colour veered more towards the chestnut, her eyes narrowed, a splash of freckles appeared across her nose… And there were the words, of course. Marlene's words—_his _words—now appeared scrawled across her chest, down her arms, down behind her back…

"It appeared at dawn, like it always done," Marlene said, not lowering her wand. "Has this always been you? Merlin's fucking Beard… a Death Eater as a soulmate. If you think I won't kill you right now, anyways…"

"I'm trying to get out," Regulus said quickly. "I'm trying to get out, I have a plan."

"Isn't that convenient?" Marlene said. "Just as you're in the hands of an Order member with quite the reputation…"

"I wouldn't hurt you," Regulus said.

Marlene laughed. "Maybe I would have believed you if I'd had another week or two to mourn Edgar Bones—and his wife and children, actually…"

Regulus swallowed.

"I can tell you who did that," Regulus said.

"Coward," she said. "You haven't even seen my interrogation techniques yet…"

"I'm not a coward," Regulus said, his voice hardening. "I just don't care about what you'll then do to them. I'll tell you so that you know you can trust me. Then you know you can trust the other things I'm saying."

He didn't mean to stare, but his eyes found his latest words on her left, just above her heart. _They're probably true. But so is what I'm saying now. _

Marlene let go of him and pushed him back towards the wall, roughly. He slid down. She also took his wand which, again, Regulus couldn't be too surprised about.

"You're really trying to leave?" Marlene asked, swallowing hard. "Don't lie to me."

"I will," Regulus said. In case she was a Legilimens, he dropped all his defenses and spoke as honestly as he could—for the first time in months. And it felt _good._ "I know how I'm going to do it. I just need to finish a few things. Put my affairs in order and then hit where it hurts on my way out..."

"You feel that your life's in danger," Marlene noted.

"Every minute," Regulus said. "But I'll make it worthwhile."

"Is there anything I can help you with?" Marlene said. She put up her glamour again. "I'm a woman of many talents."

"So I hear," Regulus said. "I mean, as I see, too. Well, not just seeing, because, umm..."

Marlene smiled. "You're much more bashful than your brother. Sirius may as well have been tapped like a maple tree and drained of all his shame and decency."

"You know him?" Regulus said, even if he already knew. Hogwarts aside, with the Potters wrapped up in the Order, it was clear that Sirius would too.

"I do," Marlene said. "He'd be… well, he's a hard one to read but I think he'd be proud to hear that you're… on your way out."

Regulus swallowed, hard.

"Don't tell him," Regulus said. "It may take time—there's something I… I just really have to do it, first."

"I've offered my services once and I'll do it again," Marlene said. "Is there anything that you need?"

He shook his head. "I have to do it alone, it's… it's complicated. I would need a wand, however."

Marlene huffed, but he realized that it came with a smirk. She tossed his wand back to him.

"You're quite good," Marlene said. "At what you do."

"Thank you," Regulus said. "For what it's worth, I suppose. As are you."

Marlene offered a sarcastic little curtsy.

"I wish we had met differently," Regulus said. "Maybe sooner. Maybe before I made the mistakes I made… it was an accident, that the two of us happened to be here, following the scripts we've been given when…"

Marlene cut him off.

"I hope you realize that I have a vested interest in you making it out of this now," she said, arching an eyebrow. Regulus felt himself blush, as impossibly stupid as that was in this situation. And that was before he even mentally revisited the absolute likelihood that there was no way to retrieve the locket, other than to let himself die in exchange…

"I would like that too," Regulus said. She gave him a reason to, so it seemed.

Marlene knelt before him.

"When you're ready…" she said quietly. "I mean, _if _you make it out… My day job is at the Leaky Cauldron. I go by 'Abigail' there, hear a lot. Find me there and I can help—feed you, clothe you, hide you, build you a new life far from London… whatever it is that you need by then. Perhaps that will be a better time for us to… talk."

"Right," Regulus said. That would be nice. "Talk. I agree."

"That being said," she said softly. "I was lying, earlier... I have my own room."

"Good," Regulus breathed out. "Because I don't."


End file.
